The moments that made Caitlin Clark The Athletic’s women’s basketball Player of the Year

Our honor of naming Caitlin Clark The Athletic’s Participant of the Yr is a shock to utterly nobody.

A media outlet or group that doesn’t crown her because the nationwide participant of the yr could be committing the basketball model of heresy. Babies to grandparents and the generations in between learn about Clark’s record-setting season and her penchant for photographs that generally seem to be they’re launched from the moon.

The mythology of Caitlin Clark is rising — and can change into much more legendary if she carries Iowa to the nationwide championship recreation as soon as once more. Her wow-factor capturing has lured in informal viewers to change into not solely Iowa diehards however ladies’s faculty basketball followers. Clark has been unattainable to disregard, however one way or the other the larger her stardom, seemingly the extra under-appreciated the nuances in her recreation change into that transcend the razzle-dazzle.

Clark leads the nation with 32.7 factors per recreation (a class she’s led three of her 4 seasons), whereas additionally rating first with 8.7 assists per recreation (a class she’s led nationally the final three seasons). She’s making probably the most 3-pointers per recreation with 5.4 (a class she additionally led final season), however her 7 defensive rebounds per recreation rank her within the ninety fifth percentile of gamers. Her win shares and participant effectivity ranking, per HerHoopsStats, prime the charts.

Why Clark is the very best participant within the nation is definitely based mostly on her phenomenal talent we’ve hardly ever seen within the sport. She does a lot so effectively, she floods followers’ recollections with highlights.

However as we voted for our Participant of the Yr — admittedly, a straightforward vote void of debate this season — we tasked our ladies’s faculty basketball specialists with a more durable query. What stood out most about Clark’s memorable season?

The precision passing

As a lot enjoyable as I’ve had watching Clark launch 3s from the brand, I’ve gotta go along with an help for this. I’ve had an opportunity to see her in particular person thrice this season and I stroll away each time saying, “Tv would possibly give of us an concept of Clark as a shooter, nevertheless it doesn’t even scratch the floor by way of how good she is as a passer.” To actually perceive her imaginative and prescient and her means to seek out these needle-threading home windows, you want to have the ability to see the total courtroom, not sections chosen by a cameraperson. Seeing Clark make 60-foot passes in transition look straightforward or watching her ship an absolute rocket by means of 4 defenders isn’t going to get previous. This particular one is the help that made Clark the Huge Ten chief in assists, so it feels applicable to have a move that reveals her imaginative and prescient, precision and execution all on full show included right here. Plus, good end, Hannah Stuelke. I’ll miss that connection subsequent yr. Test the move on the 51-second mark right here:

— Chantel Jennings

The dazzling star

Even after watching Clark lead the Hawkeyes to the nationwide title recreation, I don’t suppose I understood the magnitude of what she would imply to varsity basketball till the beginning of this season, when Iowa confronted Virginia Tech in Charlotte. Witnessing greater than 15,000 followers at a impartial web site dwell and die with each second of a nonconference recreation was all of the proof needed that Clark was going to be a phenomenon wherever she went this yr. And naturally, on nationwide tv, she delivered a masterpiece, posting 44 factors, eight rebounds, and 6 assists. The record of energy convention gamers who’ve scored 44 factors in a recreation this yr? JuJu Watkins, Hannah Stuelke and Caitlin Clark, who has performed it thrice … and counting. By the best way, these different two mixed for 3 assists of their video games.

On an evening when Virginia Tech famous person Georgia Amoore scored 31 factors of her personal, Hokies coach Kenny Brooks was sensible about what it meant to go up in opposition to Clark. “I like my women,” he mentioned, “however generally you’re taking part in checkers and he or she’s taking part in chess. She’s that good.” She has been dazzling crowds – and opposing coaches – ever since.

— Sabreena Service provider

The brand 3s

Clark mentioned it herself: How else was she going to cement her place in historical past and set the NCAA ladies’s all-time scoring document than with a emblem 3? Her triple, on Iowa’s fifth possession in opposition to Michigan on Feb. 15, gave Clark the all-time document and set off raucous ovations inside a sellout Carver-Hawkeye Area. It was probably the most becoming manner for her to make historical past, and it was made all of the extra spectacular by the very fact it took her solely 2:22 for her to attain 8 factors and move former Washington star Kelsey Plum. That evening, Clark would go on to document a career-high and program document 49 factors within the Hawkeyes’ 106-89 win, placing on a masterful showcase that punctuated the night’s event. “What she’s performed to uplift our program and ladies’s basketball nationally is spectacular,” Iowa coach Lisa Bluder mentioned afterward. Clark’s passing is undeniably beautiful — by way of aptitude and accuracy — however Clark will first, and foremost, go down as among the many absolute best scorers (and shooters) within the historical past of school basketball, males’s or ladies’s. Maybe the perfect. I might have picked any variety of moments then during which she put the ball within the basket — her game-winning 3-pointer in opposition to Michigan State, her 3-pointer in opposition to Minnesota to move Lynette Woodard, her free throws to leapfrog Pete Maravich, and so forth. — however maybe no sequence epitomizes her greatness and drive like the way during which she handed Plum.

You are kidding 😂@caitlinclark22 x #Hawkeyes pic.twitter.com/afOSOY70Ku

— Iowa Girls’s Basketball (@IowaWBB) February 16, 2024

— Ben Pickman

POY voting tally

(Photograph of Caitlin Clark: Steph Chambers / Getty Photos)